Episode 25: “The Fire In Which We Burn, Part II”

Written by “Krenim”

Published March 8, 2001

“First Officer’s Log: The Excelsior crew has escaped from the Federation Maximum Security Prison and kidnapped Captain Braxton. We are currently in pursuit, and even though the Excelsior has jumped to ludicrous speed thanks to their evil first officer’s abilities, our superior drive system is allowing us to slowly catch up to them.”

The Excelsior bridge shook. Hawk checked the internal sensors. “Shields are down to 94%! Just for those keeping score, that’s two times 47%!”

Evil Braxton grinned. “They’re making sure not to hurt their dear dim-witted captain... Fortunately, as an evil villain, I have no such compulsion to not hurt them! Fire all aft weapons!”

The Excelsior fired its aft torpedoes, the impacts of which were easily absorbed by the Relativity’s shields.

Hawk noted the ineffectiveness. “Sir, I just remembered something. Remember when we got the shield upgrade at Crazy Khan’s House of Shields?”

“Of course I do, Hawk! After all, the recap was just two episodes ago...”

“Well, it just occurred to me we probably should have gotten a weapons upgrade, too.”

“Yes... But I have an idea as to how we can disable the Relativity long enough for me to exact my revenge on Captain Braxton and the entire Federation! Bwahahahaha!”

Evil Braxton picked up one of the temporal weapons of mass destruction and made his way to the Excelsior’s shuttlebay. He opened the shuttlebay doors, so that only the forcefield kept the atmosphere from blowing out into space. “Here’s the windup, and the pitch!”

And with that, Evil Braxton armed the device and threw it out the forcefield...

Yar noted something odd on the sensors. “Sir, I think they just threw something at us. Literally.”

Ducane smiled. “They must be out of ammo...”

Yar scanned the object and all the blood drained from her face. “Sir, the object is one of the temporal weapons of mass destruction that the Excelsior crew stole from the prison!”

Ducane was horrified. “All power to the shields! Ducane to all hands: Brace for impact!”

The weapon detonated the instant it hit the shields, exploding with enough force to cause the ship to start flipping over backwards.

Consoles started exploding all around the Relativity’s bridge. Ducane was not amused. “Give me a break! I thought exploding consoles were Voyager’s gimmick! Anyway, Yar, I need a damage report!”

“Shields are down, and most of our primary systems are offline!”

“How long will we need until we can resume pursuit?”

“How should I know? Who do I look like, the chief engineer?”

“No, I can honestly say you look nothing like Gul Dukat... Anyway, I want this ship operational as soon as possible!”

Captain Braxton awoke to find himself strapped on a table upside-down. Suddenly, the table began to rotate, until he found himself lying upright on an incline facing Evil Braxton, who was chuckling to himself. “So, Captain Braxton, I see you have returned to the realm of the conscious...”

“Uh, yeah... When exactly was I knocked out? I don’t remember that part of the story...”

“When Dr. Frankenstein drugged you so Dark Helmet and Yoda could be free to do other things than keep control of your mind? That wasn’t seen onscreen.”

“Oh... Anyway, what’s your evil game this time, Evil Braxton?”

“First, you use the word ‘evil’ way too much. It’s always ‘evil crew’ this and ‘evil Excelsior’ that! Get a thesaurus! Second, it’s fortunate for you that we’ve reached the part of the story where the villain explains his plan to the hero. See? I’ve even brought all sorts of charts and diagrams...”

“Very impressive. Okay, begin with the explanation...”

“Okay, I first got the idea for this plan when Dax made the offhand comment that you were getting smarter. Now, no Federation medicine, no matter how good, can make that kind of longterm progress on curing temporal psychosis. So, I thought about it, and came to this conclusion: The Borg implant in your brain is responsible!”

“You mean the implant I got way back in Episode 5 when Seven of Nine got sick of me repeating everything everyone else said and injected nanoprobes into me which built a Borg implant in my brain that would give me a shock anytime I did so?”

“Yeah, that’s the one. I ran a scan of your brain while you were unconscious, and it turns out the implant is also curing your temporal psychosis.”

“That’s nice to know and all, but what does this have to do with your evil plan?”

“Well, the first part of my plan is to have my revenge on you. So, I’m going to have Dr. Frankenstein remove the Borg implant from your brain, thus leaving you as you were back at the beginning of the series!”

“You friend!”

“I think you mean ‘fiend,’ you moron...”

“Right... You fiend!”

“That’s not all, Captain! I know that your temporal psychosis is amplified around temporal phenomena, so I’m going to launch you in an escape pod into the gravitational field of a black hole! Once you cross the event horizon, no one will be able to save you, and the time dilation effects will make sure that you are trapped inside your own twisted mind for all eternity! Mwhahaha!”

“That’s awful!”

“Well, they don’t call me Evil Braxton for nothing...”

“And what’s the second part of your plan?”

“I’m going to detonate all of the temporal weapons of mass destruction we’ve stolen all at the same time, thus destroying the Federation!”

“You’ll never get away with this!”

“Of course I will. Your precious Relativity has been disabled, so there’s no one to stop me! Dr. Frankenstein, prep the good Captain for surgery...”

To Be Continued...

UPN Promo:

Next time on Star Trek: Series ?, it’s the last episode of Season 1! Will Captain Braxton be restupidified? Will Evil Braxton destroy the Federation? Stay tuned...